New POS Security from Old System Topology - PaymentsViews.com (George Peabody) - "Returning all the payment logic to the POS terminal is another step forward, benefiting the ISV, its merchant customers, and the payment ecosystem itself."

The Crypto-Technology and Bitcoin Landscape - Startup Management - "I spent the last month combing and classifying through the crypto-technology market, and what started like a 3-day spreadsheet project with an expectation of reaching 100 companies, mushroomed into a large publishable database of 425 companies, spread across 64 sub-categories."

Line Expands Mobile Payment Service - Wall St. Journal - "Line said the alliance with CyberSource, whose payment management and security services are used by over 400,000 businesses worldwide, is aimed at accelerating Line Pay’s growth outside Japan, but declined to share details of their planned cooperation."

On the Wires:

Visa, Pizza Hut and Accenture Develop Connected Car Commerce Experience - “By 2020 it is estimated that more than 250 million vehicles worldwide will include some form of embedded connectivity1,” says Bill Gajda, senior vice president of Innovation and Strategic Partnerships, Visa Inc. “As the number of connected cars on the road increases, so does our ability to bring secure online commerce to consumers everywhere. We initially focused on a specific use case – ordering a meal on your way home – but we envision a world where consumers can seamlessly make many of their everyday purchases from the car.”

Stratos Launches First-To-Market Connected Payment Card, Shipping April 2015 - “Stratos exists to empower consumers to make smarter, more secure payment decisions – all with the benefit of consolidating the cards in their wallets,” said Thiago Olson, Co-Founder and CEO of Stratos. “Replacing the dumb plastic we carry every day, Stratos Card is connected hardware designed to improve how we pay with more security, better decisions and ease of use. Stratos is reinventing your wallet and cards just like the iPod and iTunes reinvented your CD collection.”

Costco Names Citi, Visa as New Credit Partners - Wall St. Journal - "Costco Wholesale Corp. on Monday named Citigroup Inc. and Visa Inc. as its new credit partners, replacing American Express Co. as the exclusive network at its stores beginning in April of next year."

Visa and Samsung Bring Mobile Payments to the New Samsung Galaxy S6 - “Working in partnership with Samsung, we are able to bring secure mobile payments to millions of consumers around the world,” said Ryan McInerney, global president, Visa Inc. “Combining Visa’s expertise in payment technology with Samsung’s global leadership in creating innovative mobile experiences gives more choice to financial institutions who want to enable their customers to pay with the new generation of mobile devices.”

MasterCard Works with Samsung to Deliver Samsung Pay - “This is an exciting time for payments,” said Ed McLaughlin, chief emerging payments officer, MasterCard. “As consumers are increasingly relying on their mobile devices in their everyday lives, we are excited to work with an industry leader like Samsung to deliver new payment options to our cardholders around the world. We have been a pioneer of mobile commerce innovation for years and together we’re delivering a digital payment experience that is both simple and secure.”

U.S. Bank, Samsung Working on New Mobile-Payments Service - “We're thrilled to have payments become a core capability of the mobile phone,” said Pam Joseph, vice chairman and head of U.S. Bank Payment Services. “The result of mobile payments is that our customers can use the same, familiar credit-card payment system but with added security and convenience.”

Visa and Airtel Extend Mobile Payments to Seven African Countries - “Mobile payments can transform the lives of people throughout Africa who commonly have access to a mobile phone, but not a bank,” said Vish Sowani, Vice President of MNO Partnerships for Visa. “For most new subscribers, this will represent their first payment account and bring some of the latest digital payment advancements into the everyday experiences of Airtel’s customers.”

Announcing Bango Grid: The Global Launch Pad for Carrier Billing - Ray Anderson, Bango CEO said: “There are more than 700 MNOs globally, with different billing systems. It is no surprise that even the most ambitious app stores have not yet achieved 100 MNO activations. Bango Grid is rocket fuel for app stores, providing the only way to increase carrier billing activations at scale. For the first time, the tools required to activate hundreds of markets are all in one place, through one integrated system. Backed-up by the Bango Payments Platform, app stores can now make carrier-billed payment a reality for every customer."

MasterCard and Cubic to Make Mobile Devices the Remote Control for Global Cities - “MasterCard and Cubic, both lead members in the Smart Cities Council, share a vision to improve quality of life for everyday citizens in cities and help authorities to better manage population growth and urban development,” said Will Judge, head of Urban Mobility, MasterCard Enterprise Partnerships. “Combining our expertise and reach allows us to ultimately drive greater value and make consumers’ lives easier and more enjoyable as they travel around and between connected cities.”

ACI Worldwide and STS PayOne Partner to Provide ePayment and Fraud Prevention Services to the Middle East - Commenting on the partnership, Mr. Janti Abdallah, STS PayOne General Manager, said: “We strive to offer the best ePayment solutions to our clients, which includes providing the highest levels of security and fraud prevention. We were among the first to adopt and promote 3D Secure in the region, in addition to PKI and SSL encryption, not to mention achieving PCI-DSS compliance. The partnership with ACI Worldwide is in line with this eagerness to adopt best practices in fraud prevention and sustain our distinction and innovation.”

Intel Launches New Mobile SoCs, LTE Solution - “The evolution of the mobile landscape and growth of smart, connected devices has led to increased demand for more connectivity and real-time, protected data on those devices,” said Krzanich. “All of these factors are driving a transformation of the network to accelerate the delivery of new personal computing experiences, services and capabilities in a safe and secure manner. Intel is one of the only companies in the world that can provide solutions end-to-end for the full spectrum of mobility.”

NXP Launches New Secure Service Development Platform for Secure Mobile Transactions - “The SSDP supports partners wanting to create new secure applications by removing the technical challenges they face in getting credentials on to the secure element in phones and wearable devices. Now, instead of taking months, new applications can be created and validated in a matter of weeks,” said Jeff Miles, VP Business Development, NXP Semiconductors. “The SSDP will streamline the process for the development community therefore enabling phone and wearable technology manufacturers to bring these new apps to market faster.”

Raise Welcomes Gift Card Pioneer Don Kingsborough to Board of Directors - “Don has had a career full of incredible successes, and the role he played in cementing gift cards as a shopping staple has really set the stage for what we do at Raise,” said George Bousis, founder and CEO of Raise. “He's seen everything on all sides of the spectrum and will be a valued advisor to the company as we rely on his unparalleled experience and know-how to help manage growth, expectations, hiring, infrastructure and more."

SecureKey Announces $19M in New Funding to Broaden Adoption of Its Identity Network Services - “SecureKey allows organizations to build or subscribe to an identity network that connects consumers to online services via a trusted third-party credential of their choice, where both privacy and security are paramount,” said Charles Walton, CEO of SecureKey. “The funding will help SecureKey accelerate its growth, as people, governments, and organizations worldwide embrace a future that removes the burden of passwords while giving consumers the convenience, choice, and control they deserve.”

Amex’s Loss in Court May Not Help Consumers - New York Times Dealbook - "The result, at best, will be that fees will come down for retailers but they will pocket the difference and simply end up with bigger profits."

MasterCard Drives Host Card Emulation (HCE) Momentum with Mobile Payment Deployments in More than 15 Countries - “Our vision for digital payments is to create great experiences for consumers across all channels and all devices, and HCE and cloud-based software provide another path forward for MasterCard and our partners to deliver on that vision,” said James Anderson, Group Head and Senior Vice President, Shared Platform Services at MasterCard. “The approach will drive greatly expanded availability of mobile contactless and remote payments, through integration with MasterPass, our global digital platform.”

For Finsphere, 'Mobile As Identity' Is Its Reason For Being - "Finsphere CEO Michael Buhrmann said Visa's MLC represents the first major commercial application of the "mobile as identity" concept. On a global basis, the value of this type of confirmation to banks and other issuers of credit and debit cards is estimated to exceed $3 billion annually for their handling of legitimate transactions that are denied unnecessarily because of suspected fraud."

Visa Europe: Payment tokenisation service launched - Sandra Alzetta, Executive Director, Core Products for Visa Europe commented: “This is an exciting time to be in the payment industry. We believe that 2015 will be the year that mobile payments will be in the hands of consumers across Europe. Tokenisation is one of the most important technologies to emerge in digital payments and has the potential to start a whole new chapter in the kinds of products that are developed. For that reason, we’ve designed this flexible and scalable service, enabling issuers, merchants and acquirers to provide consumers with the next generation of innovative payment methods – all with the high level of security they expect.”

Visa Europe: Global expansion of peer-to-peer payments capabilities - "Visa Europe has partnered with Singapore-based fastacash to enable a new feature for member banks to extend to their customers. This new social feature makes it easy for Visa Direct users to send peer-to-peer payments via social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and LinkedIn."

So, you want to start a payments company? - VentureBeat (Danny Shader) - "Today, the new opportunities to make money are not in payments processing but in leveraging technology to get around the incumbents’ lock on distribution or scale. The most successful businesses use payments as the “excuse” or “hook” that gives them permission to solve other hard problems that customers are willing to pay for."

Mobile Commerce Poised to Eclipse Traditional Online Spend - “We are on the cusp of the mobile-first era,” said Anuj Nayar, senior director of global initiatives for PayPal. “At PayPal we’ve seen our mobile growth rise from less than one percent of our payment volume in 2010 to more than 20 percent in 2014.”

Samsung to Acquire LoopPay, Transformative Digital Wallet Platform - “This acquisition accelerates our vision to drive and lead innovation in the world of mobile commerce. Our goal has always been to build the smartest, most secure, user-friendly mobile wallet experience, and we are delighted to welcome LoopPay to take us closer to this goal,” said JK Shin, President and Head of IT and Mobile Division at Samsung Electronics.

WorldRemit Raises $100M Funding Round to Drive Global Growth - WorldRemit founder and CEO, Ismail Ahmed said: “I am delighted that TCV is joining WorldRemit in our mission to enable the seamless movement of money between people across borders. We have an amazing opportunity to shake-up a stale industry and to save our customers time and money. We are taking money transfers into the mobile age, where people send from apps and receive on Mobile Money services.”

Commerce.Innovated. from MasterCard and Silicon Valley Bank Returns - “We’re meeting incredible entrepreneurs in the fintech space through this program, helping them navigate potential roadblocks and getting to their next milestone with advice and connections in the payments space,” said Reetika Grewal, head of Silicon Valley Bank’s payments strategy.

Credit card giant moves to devalue hacked data - Politico Pro - "Visa’s larger goal is to replace the card data stored by e-commerce retailers with tokens and bind those tokens to a particular merchant. That means tokenized credit card data stolen from Amazon couldn’t be used to buy something on eBay."

Will SBOs Invest In Mobile Payments? - eMarketer - "According to a December 2014 study by Rocket Lawyer, 60.4% of US small-business owners (SBOs) said they would consider adopting mobile payments, such as Apply Pay, Google Wallet or Square, in 2015."

What is the Significance of Bitcoin’s Price? - Xapo Blog - "This process will take many years to fully develop, and mature, not unlike the early days of the internet, but we’re on track, despite anyone who thinks the price of bitcoin says otherwise."

Visa to Remove 16-Digit Account Number in Online and Mobile Payments - “In 2015, Visa will offer secure payments across a wide variety of devices, platforms and apps,” said Charlie Scharf, chief executive officer, Visa Inc. “In order to enable these innovative new ways to pay, we are deploying smart technologies that help to prevent fraud, while also maintaining consumer and merchant trust in digital commerce.”

Infinite Peripherals® Equips JetBlue® Airways to Become the First Airline To Accept Apple Pay™ Onboard - “By placing thoughtful new technology into the hands of our crewmembers, we can free them up to offer a more personalized experience to our customers,” said Christopher McCloskey, director of customer experience delivery at JetBlue. "Our very successful partnership with Infinite Peripherals has helped us deliver this implementation very quickly, making JetBlue the first to accept Apple Pay in the air.”

The future of Visa and other card schemes - Financial Services Club Blog - "Someone asked me yesterday: what do you think will happen to the card schemes in the future? I hadn’t thought about it much lately, but suddenly realised that the card schemes face a real melting pot of change."

On the Wires:

First Data and Capgemini Form Global Alliance to Deliver Next Generation Payment Solutions - "Never before in the history of financial services has the speed of change been faster, and competition for customers more fierce," said Guy Chiarello, president of First Data. "Our singular focus is helping our clients grow their businesses, and this important global alliance with Capgemini helps deliver on that commitment by enabling our clients to navigate an evolving global marketplace with our optimal solutions and deployment expertise."

Intuit Urges Industry to Join Fight to Combat Tax Fraud - "Intuit consistently invests in leading-edge technology, world-class technologists and pioneering products that help prevent, detect and respond to suspicious and fraudulent data activity. The company today announced plans to acquire Porticor, a leader in cloud-based security, headquartered in Israel."

Egyptian Government, MasterCard sign MoU to Drive Financial Inclusion - Ajay Banga, Chief Executive Officer, MasterCard said: “This partnership highlights our commitment to Egypt and its people. It’s crucial for us to join forces with governments around the world to accelerate positive change for citizens. We have a long and rich history in Egypt, and we are excited about the opportunity to provide more Egyptians with access to financial services.”

Wells Fargo Survey: Small Business Optimism Highest in Seven Years - “The overall Index score speaks to the general improvements that many small businesses experienced in 2014,” said Lisa Stevens, Wells Fargo head of Small Business “With the economy improving every day, many business owners are seeing stronger revenues and are feeling a renewed sense of confidence and expecting an even better year ahead.”

Wells Fargo Customers Can Now Redeem Credit Card Rewards at ATMs - “Customers live their lives on-the-go and being able to conveniently and simply access their accounts and rewards when and how they want is important,” said Alicia Moore, head of Wells Fargo ATM Banking. “We are always looking for ways to add innovative features and benefits to our ATM network, which gives customers access to their money and accounts 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. By providing customers the ability to redeem rewards for cash or account credit directly at the ATM, we’ve made it more convenient for them to feel truly rewarded for doing business with Wells Fargo.”

First Data Receives Data Security Approval from UK Information Commissioner’s Office - “We are committed to setting the industry standard for superior data privacy protection,” said Cindy Armine-Klein, Chief Control Officer at First Data. “By conforming to the strict data privacy standards set forth by the EU, we can offer our clients the peace of mind that comes with knowing they have a trusted partner managing their data.”

Four More PSCU Credit Unions Enable Members to Use Apple Pay - "PSCU announced today that Visa cardholders with consumer debit and credit cards from Altra Federal Credit Union (Onalaska, WI), Andrews Federal Credit Union (Suitland, MD), and Wescom Credit Union (Pasadena, CA); and members with credit cards from BECU (Tukwila, WA) now have access to Apple Pay..."

Remitly Expands to India - "Remitly’s coverage in India spans a network of over 120 banks and their branches. Instant direct deposit is available for many banks year-round, 24/7, including ICICI, Yes Bank, and PNB. Four-hour deposit is available during regular Indian banking hours for all other banks."

Apple Pay review: 3 months later - iMore.com - "Using Apple Pay is awesome and keeps me from pulling out my credit card all the time, but it's not so widespread that I can just leave my wallet at home."

How, and Why, Apple Overtook Microsoft - New York Times - "This week, both Microsoft and Apple unveiled their latest earnings, and the once unthinkable became reality: Apple’s market capitalization hit $683 billion, more than double Microsoft’s current value of $338 billion."

Nine awesome Bitcoin projects at Princeton - Freedom to Tinker Blog - "As promised, here are the final project presentations from the Bitcoin and cryptocurrency technologies class I taught at Princeton. I encouraged students to build something real, rather than toy class projects, and they delivered."

MasterCard Incorporated Reports Fourth-Quarter and Full-Year 2014 Financial Results - “Despite a mixed global economy, we delivered solid results for the quarter and for the full year in 2014,” said Ajay Banga, president and CEO, MasterCard. “This year is off to a good start with several new wins, as well as renewals of some important customer agreements, with more in the pipeline. Looking ahead, we will continue to be at the forefront of our industry by driving payment innovation with solutions such as MasterPass, and by increasing electronic payments usage globally as demonstrated by our significant expanded acceptance footprint across Africa.”

Google taps WePay to put Wallet support in 200K more online stores - VentureBeat - “This integration with WePay will now expand its reach and allow us to support small business owners through WePay’s hosted payment offering, making it easier for them to accept payments online and on mobile devices,” says Steve Klebe, Business Development, Payments for Google.

First U.S. Bitcoin Exchange Set to Open - Wall St. Journal - "Coinbase Inc., a startup backed by $106 million from the New York Stock Exchange, banks and venture-capital firms, said its exchange will offer greater security for individuals and institutions to trade bitcoin and monitor real-time pricing of the cryptocurrency."

Increasing the GDP of the Internet - MIT Technology Review - "In an interview with MIT Technology Review’s San Francisco bureau chief, Tom Simonite, in the cafeteria at his company’s headquarters in the Mission district of San Francisco, CEO and cofounder Patrick Collison explains how he is trying to increase the small fraction of spending that takes place through e-commerce."

NACHA Statement on Federal Reserve’s Strategies for Improving the U.S. Payment System - "NACHA applauds the Federal Reserve for its leadership role in developing Strategies for Improving the U.S. Payment System and shares much of its vision for the future of payments. In fact, the Federal Reserve’s plan complements NACHA’s 2012 ACH Blueprint, which is designed to serve as a guidepost for the evolution of the ACH Network over the next decade."

Announcing Google Wallet for WePay - "By teaming up with Google, WePay is the first payment company of its kind to enable partners and their end-users to support Google Wallet without having to spend the time and effort to integrate with Google themselves."

NCR Silver Offers Small Businesses More Payment Options - “With the new integration, accepting bitcoin is as easy as running a credit card transaction,” said Cloud99 Vapes Co-owner Robert Testagrossa. “With our previous POS, we were using a hybrid system. It was inelegant and cumbersome. With NCR Silver, it’s completely seamless.”

Bitcoin and the Digital-Currency Revolution - Wall St. Journal - "No digital currency will soon dislodge the dollar, but bitcoin is much more than a currency. It is a radically new, decentralized system for managing the way societies exchange value."

Winklevoss Twins Aim to Take Bitcoin Mainstream - New York Times - "The exchange, which the twins have financed themselves, is a risky bet, given that the virtual currency industry has been a target of hackers and has faced existential questions about its legitimacy."

EBay Announces Job Cuts, Icahn Pact - Wall St. Journal - "EBay Inc. announced plans to cut about 2,400 jobs, or about 7% of its workforce, as the e-commerce giant prepares to spin off its PayPal electronic-payments business later this year from marketplace."

The 3Ps of the blockchain: platforms, programs and protocols - O'Reilly Radar - "Although it may be early to baptize new buzz lingo like “Blockchain as a Service” (BaaS) or “Blockchain as a Platform” (BaaP), there is a burgeoning landscape of various implementations and activity in and around the blockchain’s decentralized consensus protocol technologies."

Walmart offering cash pickup option for tax refunds - Chain Store Age - "In its newest move to offer more in-store financial services, Walmart is offering shoppers the option to pick up their tax refunds in cash. The new service, called Walmart Direct2Cash, is available nationwide starting Jan. 20."

Intuit Buys ZeroPaper, Its First Acquisition In Brazil - TechCrunch - "We are thrilled to work with ZeroPaper to reach small businesses, many just getting started and others, more established and larger businesses in need of the robust solutions in the QuickBooks Ecosystem, Dan Wernikoff, SVP & GM of the Small Business Group.

Synchrony Financial Partners with GPShopper on Mobile Customer Engagement Platform - "The investment enables Synchrony Financial, a premier consumer financial services company with 80 years of retail heritage, to complement its proprietary mobile offerings, which currently include account acquisition, management and reward redemption. An expanded suite of solutions for retailers will integrate credit more easily into the shopping experience with personalized offers, mobile payment capabilities, loyalty programs and other key features."

BillMatrix Payments from Fiserv Enables Visa Card Payments for Con Edison Customers - “Our customers value convenience and choice, and with BillMatrix Payments from Fiserv, we are able to deliver more of the payment options our customers want,” said Joe Duggan, a manager in Con Edison’s Strategic Applications Department. “The addition of Visa-branded cards as a payment option has been particularly well-received by our customers.”

Fiserv Puts Control in the Hands of Cardholders With Mobile Card Management Application - "CardValet from Fiserv is a turnkey mobile application that can be downloaded from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store. Using CardValet, cardholders can turn their card off when their card is not in use, establish spending limits to allow transactions up to a certain dollar value and decline transactions when amounts exceed predefined thresholds. In addition, transactions can be monitored or controlled for specific merchant categories, such as travel, restaurants, or entertainment, and can be denied or reported for specific types of merchants."

ShopKeep Pocket Mobile App Launches with Powerful, Real-Time Reporting Features - "ShopKeep Pocket is a best-in-class mobile reporting application that enables merchants to quickly access their business data in real-time, wherever they are. The new app will work in tandem with ShopKeep Register, the company’s point of sale application, and offers users the ability to monitor business operations via their mobile devices, permitting increased connectivity and productivity on-the-go."

Western Union to Launch Direct to Bank from US to Mexico - "An agreement recently signed between Western Union and UniTeller, will allow Western Union customers in the US to send cash directly into qualifying bank accounts – totaling more than 60 million individual bank accounts1. The UniTeller network currently covers top banks in Mexico."

Toward Better Privacy, Data Breach Laws - Krebs on Security - "President Obama on Monday outlined a proposal that would require companies to inform their customers of a data breach within 30 days of discovering their information has been hacked. But depending on what is put in and left out of any implementing legislation, the effort could well lead to more voluminous but less useful disclosure."

Gujarat State Government and MasterCard sign Memorandum of Understanding to Accelerate Electronic Payments - “This MOU represents a joint effort to drive innovation and development of electronic payments in Gujarat, in line with the State Government’s goal to make Gujarat the first digital payments state in India. MasterCard will leverage its global expertise to deliver new innovations and the right payment systems, and we are looking forward to seeing fruitful results from this collaboration,” said Ari Sarker, Division President, South Asia & Country Corporate Officer, India at MasterCard.

First Data and UL Collaborate to Simplify EMV™ Adoption for Retailers - “Coupled with a multi-layered security program that includes tokens and encryption, EMV adoption will greatly reduce the threat of fraudulent payments at the point of sale, but the implementation can be complex and burdensome. We believe this collaboration with UL will help to simplify the process a merchant must complete to certify compliance with EMV standards.”

Elavon Joins Verizon Partner Program - “This powerful combination makes the era of Big Data accessible and relevant for small businesses,” said Elavon’s President of North America Guy Harris. “By building in robust customer loyalty and security features more commonly found in high-end POS options, this user-friendly solution enables SMBs to serve their customers better while providing business insights to help them compete more effectively.”

Intuit Launches QuickBooks Online Self-Employed to Serve Freelancers, Independent Contractors - “As the on-demand economy continues to expand, there will be unprecedented income opportunities for freelancers. But this work comes with a host of new challenges: co-mingled and confusing business expenses, quarterly and year-end tax headaches, and a general lack of visibility into their ‘real income’,” said Alex Chriss, vice president and general manager of Self-Employed Solutions at Intuit.

TSYS Releases Insights on Payment Preferences of Business Travelers and Travel Administrators - “One surprising finding is that despite high satisfaction with corporate travel card programs among both business travelers and travel administrators, personal card usage among business travelers remains high,” said author Christina Hall, senior product development manager, TSYS Commercial Services. “Additionally, the technologies that business travelers use in their personal banking and credit card relationships greatly influence expectations for their corporate credit cards.”

Fitch: AmEx, Discover Can Manage EU Card Interchange Fee Caps - "Fitch believes increased regulation could have some unintended consequences. For example, card members could face higher fees and/or reduced benefits as banks re-assess these programs and seek to maintain appropriate profitability targets. Fitch believes these could potentially take the form of annual membership fees, account maintenance or other fees and/or more limited rewards."

MasterCard Reaches Deal with Russia - Wall St. Journal - "MasterCard and Russia’s national payment system agreed on Dec. 30 to gradually move the processing of the U.S. company’s transactions within Russia under the roof of its Russian counterpart, the central bank said."

Alibaba Pays to Play in India - Wall St. Journal - "The Indian company’s prize asset is Paytm, a mobile-payments platform, which also runs an online marketplace in India that matches merchants to shoppers, similar to Alibaba’s business model in China."

Level Money has joined Capital One - Level Money Blog - "Much younger and nimbler than any other top bank, Capital One is a founder-led company on a mission to transform the way banking is done. Taking a technology-based, consumer-centric focus to banking is core to what Capital One does, and on that team we found a deep passion for solving old problems in a new way."

Why Tort Liability Won’t Produce Good Cybersecurity - Steptoe Cyberblog (Stewart Baker) - "In the end I doubt that liabilities to issuing banks will drive much cybersecurity either, not because the claims are low — they’re more likely to be in the $50 per card range — but because establishing liability will not be all that easy and because things like tokenization will likely prove much cheaper than improving security.)"

Heartland First to Offer Comprehensive Merchant Breach Warranty - "Heartland’s breach warranty is offered at no charge to its Heartland Secure™ merchants in the first year and can be extended for $8.33 per month per card-entry device. To be covered under the warranty, a merchant must have a Heartland Secure-certified device and process payments through Heartland on that device."

Verifone Offers Merchants a Single mPOS Payment Terminal to Support All Major Smart Device Options - “The prospect of having to purchase new mPOS devices for sales associates when smartphones and tablets are upgraded has been a major inhibitor to mPOS investment among retailers,” said Mark Shockley, senior vice president of Mobile Solutions for Verifone. “Verifone’s single, modular solution will offer the ultimate in mPOS flexibility, allowing it to persist across changes in devices, even if somebody wants to make a complete switch from one OS to another.”

Vantiv Certifies Verifone’s Secure Commerce Architecture - “Vantiv’s certification of SCA from Verifone combined with Point-to-Point Encryption ensures many more merchants can significantly reduce their exposure to large scale payment data breaches, and further reduce the complexity associated with EMV certification,” said Rob McMillon, vice president of Product Security for Verifone.

NCR Unveils a New ‘Grab and Go’ Self-Checkout Solution - "Whether in the supermarket or at a convenience, department, specialty or DIY retailer, there is a large amount of checkout traffic that can be handled with this card-only, small footprint solution,” says Dusty Lutz, general manager self-checkout solutions at NCR Retail. “This technology is ideally designed for ‘grab-and-go’ convenience for driving more revenue and convenience during peak shopping hours.”

Payments Business Will Bypass Banks, Says Adyen Boss - Wall St. Journal - "Sounds like the bread and butter of banks, but Pieter van der Does, Adyen co-founder and chief executive officer, has no doubt that the payments business will increasingly bypass banks. In fact, he’s counting on it."

Academic Research on Bitcoin Tripled in 2014 - CoinDesk - "Academia is increasingly focusing on bitcoin, and hundreds of papers on the subject have now been published, according to research by author and alternative finance commentator Brett Scott."

On the Wires:

EMVCo to Manage Next Generation of 3D-Secure Specification - "The enhanced specification will support additional data available during the transaction that will enable more intelligent risk-based decisioning. It will also offer a more seamless consumer experience and reduces reliance on the cardholder to authenticate themselves via a password prompt, better integrating with a merchant’s offering and brand. The specification will also be enriched to support non-payment user identification and verification, as well as country-specific and regulatory requirements regarding cardholder authentication in the card-not-present environment."

If you have questions about our payments education program, please contact Carol Coye Benson for more information.

On the Web:

U.S. Consumers' Holdings and Use of $100 Bills - Federal Reserve Bank of Boston - "Conventional wisdom asserts that $100 bills are often associated with crime and foreign cash holdings, leading some commentators to call for their elimination; in light of this proposal, it is useful to examine the legal, domestic use of cash. This report uses new data from the 2012 Diary of Consumer Payment Choice (DCPC) to evaluate consumer use of $100 bills as a means of payment."

Block Chain 2.0: The Renaissance of Money - Wired - "So for the uninitiated who have not yet grasped what Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are, you ought to catch up. This is not something that should be ignored and there is a vast array of resources that explain the concept."

ICICI Bank launches contactless debit & credit cards - Economic Times - "The bank has introduced these two cards in Mumbai, Hyderabad and Gurgaon to begin with and it has installed over 1,200 PoS machines capable of accepting contactless payments in these cities."

Top 10 Payments Events in 2014 - Portals and Rails - "As the year draws to a close, the Portals and Rails team would like to share its own "Top 10" list of major payments-related events and issues that took place in the United States this year."

Gang Hacked ATMs from Inside Banks - Krebs on Security - "...this gang specializes in hacking into banks directly, and then working out ingenious ways to funnel cash directly from the financial institution itself."

MasterCard Launches Global Hackathon Series with $100,000 Grand Prize - “We encourage developers from around the world to participate in our Masters of Code competition and use the power of MasterCard through our APIs to create the next generation of commerce applications globally,” said Mario Shiliashki, Senior Vice President of Open APIs, MasterCard. “MasterCard is the world’s most advanced payments network, and the MasterCard Developer Zone is the bridge to it for developers. We are opening up our technology to the world for a simple reason – to enable any developer to utilize our products and platforms to build the next big thing.”

CashStar and PayPal Partner to Expand Digital Gift Card Delivery - “We’re excited to work closely with PayPal and our top retailer and restaurant client brands on this solution,” said Ben Kaplan, CashStar president and CEO. “As digital, mobile and social innovations continue to change the way consumers shop, digital gift cards thrive because of their ability to move seamlessly across channels."

Fidelity® Customers Have Earned More Than $845 Million Using Fidelity Rewards Credit Cards - "According to a new survey from Fidelity, more than half (55 percent) of credit cardholders own a rewards credit card, with cash back rewards the most popular choice, held by nearly two-out-of-three rewards card holders (63 percent); 47 percent own credit cards offering points toward merchandise, followed by airline miles (39 percent) and gas, dining or other forms of rewards (39 percent)."

New York Regulator Outlines Changes to Bitcoin Rules - New York Times - "Although far from sweeping, the revised rules will address or eliminate many of the aspects that opponents had criticized for being vague or strict, including the types of companies that would be subject to the rules, Mr. Lawsky said in keynote remarks at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington."

Mobile NFC payments to exceed $130B by 2020: report - Mobile Commerce Daily - “The launch of Apple Pay will focus the minds of operators and competitors like Google Wallet, who have NFC-based payment offerings for longer, but have not really communicated or marketed it well to their customers.”

Mobile’s Rise Poses a Riddle for Banks - Wall St. Journal - "This year, for the first time, U.S. customers interacted with their banks more through mobile devices than any other means, according to a new study by consultancy Bain & Co. Mobile interactions are now 35% of the total, more than any other type, including traditional online channels, automated-teller machines and branch visits, the report showed."

Open APIs Hold the Key to the Future of Banking - Programmable Web - "One of the pillars of BBVA’s digital strategy is identifying and mobilizing “innovation stakeholders” from both within and outside BBVA. Through an open innovation framework, BBVA is building an open ecosystem that includes entrepreneurs, developers, students, customers and employees collaborating to create new value for both the community and BBVA in the new digital paradigm."

RBC first bank in North America with Host Card Emulation - "We are committed to providing our clients with the most innovative, convenient and secure solutions to pay how they want, when they want - HCE is a critical step," said Linda Mantia , Executive Vice-President of Digital, Payments and Cards, RBC. "HCE makes RBC Secure Cloud mobile payments even easier to use."

Clustering bitcoin accounts using heuristics - O'Reilly Radar - “It turns out in reality, though, the way most users and services are using bitcoin, was really not following any of the guidelines that you would need to follow in order to achieve this notion of pseudo-anonymity. So, basically, what we were able to do is develop certain heuristics for clustering together different public keys, or different pseudonyms."

On the Wires:

Huntington Bank to Offer Apple Pay to Customers - “We are delighted to soon offer our customers the option of Apple Pay,” said Mark Sheehan, executive vice president and payments and channels director at Huntington. “Apple Pay is another in a series of initiatives Huntington has undertaken to make banking easier, along with rolling out mobile deposit and Quick Balance, which allows customers to use their phones or tablets to find their balances fast. Huntington is excited about what the future holds and looks forward to bringing this technology to our customers.”

The European Union Helps Consumers by Capping Swipe Fees While the U.S. Lags - "The 28 countries of the European Union agreed with a committee of the EU’s Parliament to cap the fees merchants pay banks every time a customer swipes a card at 0.2 percent on debit cards and at 0.3 percent on credit cards. Countries can also set a five-cent cap on debit transactions. The agreement also makes the card business more transparent, so that consumers can see how much swipe fees raise prices where they shop."

Mozido Acquires Majority Ownership in Mobile Commerce Company CorFire - “CorFire is a strong global mobile commerce player. By adding its strength in NFC-enabled mobile wallets to Mozido’s extensive mobile financial services and retail marketing capabilities, we can now give merchants around the world access to a powerful mobile ecosystem that adds monetization features to mobile programs,” said Michael Liberty, founder and Chairman of Global Strategic Initiatives at Mozido.

Silicon Valley Bank -- At The Core Of A Tech Network - Forbes - “We are doing something very, very different. We help them build a sound, scalable operating infrastructure that they would go to an investor and say they have worked with Silicon Valley Bank and the bank has looked over its fraud and compliance.”

Amazon Confirms Rollout of One-Hour Delivery Service - Wall St. Journal - "The service, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, is available in parts of New York, though Amazon said it would expand to other cities next year. Amazon will charge $7.99 for delivery within an hour, though two-hour delivery is free..."

Billing and Payments — a potted history - FastMail Blog - "As a credit card merchant, an important thing is the chargeback rate — that is, the percentage of your payments that the cardholders dispute with their bank. If this rate gets too high, then the payment gateways deem you to be risky, and they will charge much higher fees, or cancel your account completely."

Complex Solutions to a Simple Problem - Krebs on Security - "The main reason so many of these newfangled technologies are even being proposed is that the United States lags 20 years behind Europe and the rest of the world in adopting chip/smartcard technology in credit and debit cards."

Community Banks Reissue Nearly 7.5 Million Payment Cards Following Home Depot Data Breach - “Community banks continue to absorb exorbitant costs due to data breaches, and they do so upfront because their primary concern is to protect their customers. However, this is money—more than $90 million—that could be used for lending in our communities, in the form of loans to new homeowners, small business owners and budding entrepreneurs—all of which spur local economic stability and growth,” John Buhrmaster, ICBA chairman and president and CEO of 1st National Bank of Scotia, N.Y, said.

Bitcoin Companies to Showcase The World of Bitcoin at CES - "BitPay ... along with nine other bitcoin companies is bringing the “World of Bitcoin” to Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2015. By partnering with Circle, Kraken, Bitmain, Blockchain, Bitstamp, Private Internet Access, Robocoin, and yBitcoin, the World of Bitcoin will be the largest and most complete showcase of Bitcoin at CES, representing 10 brands that are shaping this explosive technology."

Regulation, the Blockchain and Programmable Money - PaymentsViews.com (George Peabody) - "Programmability of asset transfers has enormous potential to save money and simplify public and private transactions. A hallmark of any regulation should be its ability to accommodate that kind of innovation."

Stripe is the breakthrough startup of 2014 - Mashable - "Stripe is a key reason that some of these on-demand startups have been able to get off the ground so quickly — and Stripe has prospered in return. Tens of thousands of businesses now use the Stripe API for payments."

Toward a Breach Canary for Data Brokers - Krebs on Security - "Despite their apparent role in facilitating (albeit unknowingly) these ID theft services, to my knowledge the data brokers involved have never been held publicly accountable in any court of law or by Congress."

EMVCo Launches ‘A Guide to EMV Chip Technology v2.0’ - EMVco - "First published in 2011, the guide has been updated to reflect EMVCo’s new branding and imagery, detail the evolution of the technical body and communicate the latest transaction figures, first published in November 2014. The document also provides insight into the latest EMV Chip Specifications and introduces EMVCo’s Next Generation activity."

Investment in European Payment Firms Hits Record Levels - Wall St. Journal - "Nascent payments and transaction processing companies in Europe raised $417.9 million through 26 deals in the nine months to September, more than seven times what was raised during the same period last year, according to figures from data provider Dow Jones VentureSource."

Banks Urge Clients to Take Cash Elsewhere - Wall St. Journal - "J.P. Morgan told some clients of its commercial bank recently that it would begin charging monthly fees on deposit accounts from which clients can withdraw money at any time."

Why Apple Pay will win (Part 2) - Financial Services Club Blog (Chris Skinner) - "The Apple Pay wallet system, with its own bank partner (if it needs one) and now you don’t need a card registered or anything. You don’t need PayPal or Visa or MasterCard. You just need Apple. Just a thought."

Wish List: Apple Pay your friends - SixColors (Dan Moren) - "In theory, Apple could even offer the ability to send funds to people via the Internet. Apple Pay already works for some online transactions, and once again Square Cash has proved that you can transfer funds online without too much hassle."

MasterCard and Dynamics Inc. Partner to Drive Innovation within Interactive Payment Card Market - “At MasterCard, we are focused on driving innovation across the entire payments industry, and continue to invest in the technologies, solutions and companies that will help our customers and partners expand their business and serve their cardholders in new ways,” said Carlos Menendez, Group Executive, Global Credit and Debit Products at MasterCard. “In working with Dynamics, we have secured a partner with deep technology capabilities and market-leading manufacturing capabilities to help drive innovation in the interactive payment card market while moving in lockstep with MasterCard’s mobile and digital enablement strategy.”

SWIFT enters into real-time retail domestic payments - "On 2nd December, Australia's New Payments Platform (NPP) Steering Committee announced it has selected SWIFT to provide the infrastructure for its New Payments Platform (NPP) project, a new Australian fast payments infrastructure."

BitPay Integrates With DriveWealth to Bring Bitcoin to Investors Worldwide - “Providing users with the added security of bitcoin as a payment method makes the whole process easier, and gives users peace of mind,” says Tony Gallippi, Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of BitPay. “With Bitcoin, users will no longer have to wait days or weeks for an account to be funded because this integration will make their deposit process seamless.”

Fiserv Names Marc West Division President, Digital Channels - "Before joining Fiserv in 2013, West was the president and CEO at Mamasource, an e-commerce platform focused on moms, where he focused on business growth and strategic partnerships. He has also served as managing director of e-Business at Barclays Global Investors, and has held senior leadership positions at H&R Block and Electronic Arts."

The last Glenbrook Payments Boot Camp of 2014 is being held next week, December 9 and 10, in Palo Alto, California. Our Payments Boot Camp provides a comprehensive introduction to the payments systems in the U.S., an overview of global payments, and lots of insights into what's happening in emerging payments. Join Carol Coye Benson and me for this final session of the year! - register here!

Mobile Wallets: A Smart Way to Pay? - Kiplinger - "Using your smartphone to store your credit card and bank information is convenient and secure, but don’t leave your wallet at home just yet."

Apple Pay from the Front Lines - GonzoBanker - "After using my iPhone for less than a month to make about a dozen payments, I’ve actually started to unintentionally reach for my phone instead of my wallet when it’s time to pay for something. Yikes."

With Fraud Afoot, Shield Your Wallet - New York Times - "That is why it’s a good idea to use a credit card when shopping online, or if you must use a debit card, use it in conjunction with something like PayPal..."

Preparing for Chip-and-PIN Cards in the United States - New York Times - "In total, roughly 70 percent of credit cards and 40 percent of debit cards are expected to use the technology by the end of next year, though the introduction of upgraded checkout systems will not be completed until the end of the decade."

Taking One Touch™ Mobile Payments International - Braintree Blog - "Today, in an effort to help people and businesses connect more seamlessly, reduce friction from buying on mobile and support innovation globally, we’re rolling out One Touch with PayPal in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and the UK."

Why Apple Pay may be the gateway drug bitcoin needs - Gigaom - "Most consumers don’t understand the technology that is transferring the USD in their iPhone to the Walgreens, so if that was replaced with bitcoin’s blockchain technology, one may not notice."

Amadeus and Worldpay partnership further simplifies travel payments - Celia Pereiro, Head of Travel Payments at Amadeus commented: “We are pleased to partner with one of Europe’s largest payment services providers. Worldpay will help us to fulfil our customers’ payment needs across the globe through a simple payment experience offered to their travellers."

MasterCard Takes Priceless Surprises To New Heights - “Today’s surprise is just one way we’re taking our Priceless Surprises platform to a whole new level by bringing in new partners and delivering surprises through new platforms to drive cardholder affinity,” said Raja Rajamannar, chief marketing officer, MasterCard.

SimplyTapp Raises $5.9M to Propel Mobile Payment Innovation - "SimplyTapp, the leading provider of Host Card Emulation (HCE) solutions for cloud based mobile payments, today announced it has raised $5.9M of a Series B financing round from undisclosed new investors and existing investors Blue Sky Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners, bringing the total amount of funding raised to date to $7.6M."

CARDFREE Completes its Next Generation Order-Ahead Product - "This new patent license enables CARDFREE to provide its exceptional online/mobile ordering solutions within the US - for restaurants and other verticals. CARDFREE’s award-winning platform provides full commerce capabilities including cross-channel CRM, loyalty, payments and now its next generation order-ahead solution."

AribaPay Takes Off - “By automating billing and settlement and digitizing the “pay” in procure-to-pay, AribaPay is bringing the same simplicity to B2B payments and effectively changing the game by enabling companies to drive a more efficient, effective process that creates benefits on both sides of the equation.”

Most People Are Only Thinking About Compliance - Bitcoin Foundation Blog (Jim Harper) - "Without prevention of real-world harms to target, banks will manage a different risk, which is the risk of regulatory action. The incentives to “de-risk” entire business lines, including digital currency, will remain strong. Risk aversion in financial services was the top threat to Bitcoin’s success identified in the study we released earlier this year."

Discover Makes Getting Cash Rewards Easier - "Discover now makes it easier than ever for cardmembers to get their CashBack Bonus® whenever they want at any amount. In addition, CashBack Bonus rewards will never expire."

Introducing Snapcash - Snapchat Blog - "Today is a big day for us - we are launching our first product created in partnership with another company. We’re huge fans of the folks at Square and have been big admirers of Square Cash since it launched – just type a dollar amount into the subject line of an email and send cash to friends. Genius!"

Lord & Taylor expands iBeacon program to all US stores - Mobile Commerce Daily - “The results were so good on the pilot program that Hudson’s Bay will expand it to 50 stores in the United States and 90 in Canada by end of this month,” said Ryan Craver, the former senior vice president of corporate strategy at Hudson Bay Co.

Linked-In, Sun Microsystems Founders Lead Big Bet On Bitcoin Innovation - Wall St. Journal - "The company, known as Blockstream, aims to enhance bitcoin’s “blockchain” — the distributed, public ledger that is the defining technological feature — and turn it into a universal platform for multiple new applications that go far beyond the digital-currency payments for which bitcoin is best known."

Apple Adds UnionPay Payment Option for App Store Customers in China - “The ability to buy apps and make purchases using UnionPay cards has been one of the most requested features from our customers in China,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services. “China is already our second largest market for app downloads, and now we’re providing users with an incredibly convenient way to purchase their favorite apps with just one-tap.”

MoneyPass Network Partners with MasterCard on U.S. Common Debit AID Solution - “Our collaboration with MasterCard will enable the MoneyPass Network to process chip-based ATM transactions on MasterCard Debit cards,” said Troy Cullen, President of Elan Financial Services. “We are confident the agreement we have reached with MasterCard will further expand EMV adoption goals within the United States."

Dollar General Now Accepting American Express - “We strive to provide our customers with a simple and hassle-free shopping experience,” said Todd Vasos, Dollar General’s chief operating officer. “The acceptance of the American Express card makes shopping even easier by offering additional flexibility in customers’ payment choices and is consistent with many of our new initiatives, including DG Digital Coupons, which are all aimed at making it easy to save time and save money at Dollar General.”

Adventures in Attribution – The Apple vs. MCX Dialog - PaymentsViews.com (Bryan Derman) - "My instinct is that this discussion is mostly an inside debate among a group of obsessive payments professionals who have waited most of a decade for this moment of mobile payment epiphany (my kind of people, to be honest)."

Alibaba, Apple Talks on Payments Tie-Up Focused on China - Wall St. Journal - "A senior Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. executive said Tuesday that a payment alliance between Apple Inc. and the Chinese e-commerce giant's financial-services affiliate would focus on the Chinese market..."

Stripe CEO: Global Payments Are Just Getting Started - Forbes - "What we did for them is made it possible for any Stripe user to accept payments via Alipay," Collison said. "This is the first time a lot of these western businesses could transact with people in China. It was so crazy to me that this was still a problem to be solved in 2014."

FinCEN Releases Statement Encouraging Banks to Offer Services to Money Service Businesses (MSBs) - Virtual Currency Report - "The release of the statement coincides with the 2014 American Bankers Association Anti-Money Laundering Conference, held in Washington D.C., where Director Jennifer Shasky Calvery addressed many of the Nation’s banking leaders in a keynote address where she highlighted the statement and encouraged banks to improve their evaluation of MSB account applicants rather than avoid the business type altogether."

Merchant Link and Mocapay Announce Mobile Payments Alliance - "With the agreement, Merchant Link merchants will be able to accept mobile transactions and allow customers to interact with the merchant brand from any mobile device. Consumers can interact via the merchants’ branded mobile app allowing them to make credit card purchases, purchase and redeem gift cards, participate in loyalty programs and take advantage of merchant promotions."

Mozido to Integrate MasterCard Solutions into Its Mobile Payments and Services Offering - “Mozido’s mobile ecosystem brings easier, more attainable financial and mobile marketing services to merchants and customers. Their focus on the underserved is especially compelling,” said Ron Hynes, group executive, Global Prepaid, MasterCard. “Mozido’s strength in building versatile mobile financial and retail solutions that translate across borders makes the company a great partner for our prepaid card, payment, and security services.”

Apple Pay is a win for (smart) retailers - CNN Money - "But adopting Apple Pay is actually a strategic move for better customer tracking in the long run, Abraham said. If shoppers are more attached to their phones, then it's easier to communicate with them in stores via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi signals."

On the Wires:

Mastercard to Acquire TNS’ Payment Gateway Business - "MasterCard will acquire TNS’ eCommerce and card-present payment gateways, which will become part of the DataCash payment gateway suite. With the addition of TNS’ Payment Gateway Services, DataCash will be able to drive additional growth of the eCommerce category – and use of MasterCard-branded products – in North America and Latin America."

GSMA Introduces Code of Conduct for Mobile Money Providers - "The GSMA today launched a Code of Conduct for Mobile Money Providers, outlining a series of common business principles to enable the development of safe and responsible digital financial services. The first mobile network operators (MNOs) to endorse the Code are Airtel, Avea, Axiata, Etisalat, Millicom, MTN, Ooredoo, Orange, Telenor, Vodafone and Zain."

Visa, MasterCard to cut credit card fees in Canada - The Globe and Mail - "The two credit card giants, which represent about 90 per cent of the market in Canada, made separate, voluntary proposals to cut so-called interchange fees down to an average rate of 1.5 per cent through 2019."

The Worm in Apple Pay - Wall St. Journal Opinion (Lyle Beckwith - NACS) - "A mobile-payments system could link directly to an individual’s checking account, or transactions could be completed over the Internet, for example."

Poynt Gets Chase, Vantiv to Partner on Payments - "The two companies are joining as founding partners of Poynt’s payments platform for small merchants, which will also work with new forms of mobile payment such as Apple’s Apple Pay service."

W3C's Web Payments Redesign Could Bypass Bitcoin - CoinDesk - "More specifically, Jacobs said that the core topics that will be addressed are increasing interoperability and security around digital wallets, and identifying and authenticating those who are making payments."

Banks, Bitcoin & the Blockchain - Bank Systems & Technology - "Bitcoin was built for the Internet. Strip away the currency aspect and look at the technology behind Bitcoin, and you have the first Internet protocol for storing and exchanging value."

U.S. Bank is First to Europe With Visa Payables Automation for Business - “U.S. Bank corporate clients in Europe can now take advantage of Visa Payables Automation to streamline the accounts payable process,” said Tad Fordyce, SVP and head of Global Commercial Solutions, Visa Inc. “By automating, corporate clients eliminate processing steps and pay their suppliers more efficiently with safe, reliable and convenient electronic payments.”

For Apple Pay to Thrive, Small Businesses Must Adopt - StreetFight - "For a mobile wallet to really impact consumer behavior, its acceptance has to be ubiquitous — not just in the Targets and Macy’s of this world, but in our local bodegas, mom-and-pop shops, independent coffee shops and food trucks."

Apple Pay Now Available for U.S. Bank Customers - “We couldn’t be more pleased to see this day arrive for our customers,” said Dominic Venturo, chief innovation officer at U.S. Bank. “Providing our customers the ability to securely pay where, when and how they want is a central theme for our payments business. Enabling our customers to use Apple Pay is the perfect example of how we bring that philosophy to life.”

Elavon Delivers Apple Pay, EMV & Security Solutions - "Our investments in mobile and other innovative technologies are now paying off for our customers: when a business is trying to accommodate the consumer who wants to pay with their smart phone, and the next person in line who presents a chip-embedded EMV card, they know they can rely on us to help them make the sale with enhanced security and a great customer experience.”

Ingo Money to Acquire Fuze Network, Inc. - "Fuze enables its partners to add cash to more than one billion bankcards including credit, debit and prepaid cards. For example, a consumer cashing a check at a physical location can then disburse funds directly to the cards in their wallet."

BofA Merrill Announces Enhancements to Global Card Capabilities for Companies and Public Sector Clients - “Improved transparency and tighter control over expenses continue to be hot topics for organizations of all sizes in every region around the world,” said Percy Batliwalla, head of Sales for GTS. “As card programs grow in efficacy and sophistication, they are becoming an increasingly powerful tool for treasury departments – providing them the granular information they need to better manage and forecast their finances.”

CPI Card Group Launches CPIMobile™ with Sequent - "Sequent will enable CPI to deliver to global banks and other issuers a digital issuance solution that allows them to participate in almost any mobile wallet deployment, leveraging both Secure Element (SE) and Host Card Emulation (HCE) capabilities, and to enable their own banking apps for payments."

CPI Launches First EMV Prepaid Cards to Canadian Market with Berkeley Payment Solutions - “The Canadian market has already successfully migrated to EMV for financial debit and credit cards, benefiting from a significant reduction in fraud,” said Steve Montross, president and CEO of CPI Card Group. “Berkeley Payment Solutions has remained at the forefront of driving continuous innovation for its customers, and now, by extending EMV for Prepaid, truly demonstrates the company’s ability to anticipate and deliver solutions to meet the needs of its customers.”

Small Businesses Assess Their Apple Pay Options - New York Times - Mr. Boeding recommended the VeriFone VX520, which Vantiv is selling for $250: “That model is rugged, has a powerful processor, great memory, and is an N.F.C. reader that is E.M.V.-compliant.”

Are Banks Too Expensive to Use? - New York Times - "But my customers didn’t see themselves the way policy makers do. They chose to use alternative and informal financial services because they found banks to be more expensive and confusing and less service-oriented."

Chip & PIN vs. Chip & Signature - Krebs on Security - "Most card issuing banks and Visa don’t want PINs because the PINs can be stolen and used with the magnetic stripe data on the same cards (that also have a chip card) to withdraw cash from ATM machines."

Money20/20 as become the go-to event in payments... we'll be there in force. The agenda is now available and the event is 90% sold out - if you've been waiting, it's time to register! Use this promo code to register and receive a 20% discount: "GLENBR20"